The present invention relates generally to internet privacy, and in particular to prevention of identification and tracking of users via the collection of their web browsers' properties, thereby the mitigation of privacy threats.
In the current digital marketplace there exists a significant demand for detailed information regarding the online behavior of consumers. Insights provided by such data allow merchants to target individuals with highly user-specific advertisements, and enable analytics companies to predict users' consumption habits. While it is relatively trivial to collect data about the actions of a user on a single website, a challenge faced by analytics and advertising companies (“A&A companies”) has been finding ways to obtain a comprehensive picture of a user's activities by tracking him or her across multiple websites. This is sometimes referred to as “cross domain tracking”. To date, the primary solution has been through the use of cookie technology.
Cookies are data files placed on a user's computer by a web browser in accordance with instructions from a web server. Cross domain tracking historically involves website owners who partner with third-party A&A companies that use proprietary cookie technology to track the behavior of users across multiple websites. For example, a user may visit Website A, which utilizes the services of an analytics company. Code developed by the analytics company operating on Website A instructs the web browser to create a cookie on the user's computer that contains information uniquely identifying the user and the content that he or she viewed. Later, when the user visits Websites B and C—both of which utilize the same analytics company as Website A—the cookie is updated to reflect that the user viewed specific content on Websites A, B, and C. Thus, the analytics company has access to data showing the various websites and types of content preferred by the individual. For some users, a concerning manifestation of cross domain tracking occurs when a product he or she viewed on Website A appears, without solicitation, in an advertisement on Website C. Privacy conscious individuals often delete, or clear, their web browser cookies (manually or with the assistance of third party privacy software) to prevent this type of online tracking.
The deletion of cookies by privacy conscious users disrupts the data collection activities of A&A companies. To avoid such disruptions, A&A companies have begun shifting away from cookie technology and toward a new method of online tracking capable of uniquely identifying and tracking individuals by collecting properties about their web browsers. Research has shown that on average the properties associated with a web browser, once amalgamated, can uniquely identify a person with a statistically significant rate of accuracy. After an A&A company matches a specific individual with the properties of his or her web browser, e.g., by linking the user's web browser properties to login credentials (an e-mail address and password, for example), it is then possible to identify and track the user across domains with a high degree of precision. It is also exceedingly difficult for the user to prevent further tracking without switching to an entirely different web browser. Because this form of data collection cannot be prevented through the ex post deletion of files (as was the case with cookies), privacy conscious users require a technique that averts, in real-time, the appropriation of their web browser properties.
Accordingly, there is a need for technology that precludes or mitigates the ability of A&A companies—as well as other actors—to identify and track users based on the collection of the properties of their web browsers.